The illustrated guide to a Ph.D.

This is <i>exactly</i> how it feels once you get over the initial elation of passing the blasted thing!<p>Of course, with all the Ph.D.s creating little bumps all over the place, various people have to come along and fill in the gaps between the bumps. They don't get enough credit.

Do not forget that the boundaries of human knowledge have been surpassed by a healthy amount of individuals that never went the PhD route.

This is the best description by far that I've seen of most PhDs. It passes the "Would my mother understand this" test.<p>I'll be sending this to anyone who asks what a PhD is really like.

Great illustration.<p>Also why Ph.D is not for me. Too low bang/buck factor. I'd rather know a little about a lot than everything about a little. But, I'm very glad others are the opposite.

Now, add a third dimension to that diagram that describes the number of people that know any particular bit of knowledge. That's more accurately what I would describe as the "sum total of all human knowledge." It's not known if no one remembers it!<p>You can then view the work of a professor as a tension between adding shallow bumps to the perimeter and increasing the depth in the center.

I think it would work well as a guide for startups too, especially the "how it looks to you" (living inside the dent for the past x years) vs. "how it looks to a VC" (weighing your startup against the sum total of every other product and service in existence).<p>Except perhaps that only the successful startups get to make that dent.

The sum of all human knowledge probably looks more like a million dimensional koosh ball than an circle.

I always wondered: where is the list of things we (humans) forgotten/unlearned?

It's be more realistic if your little bump was built on top of lots of other people's little bumps.

I like to think I've made such dents, but have never been granted a Ph.D.

Use this mirror link if you can't get to the actual site <a href="http://bit.ly/cUavpF" rel="nofollow">http://bit.ly/cUavpF</a> (matt.might.net.nyud.net)

It's a great graphic, but I'll nitpick. There's an important distinction that's left out. During all the stages leading to the Ph.D., all the area covered was just learning, taking in what other people have done. The very last little bump on the other hand actually added new area, so it's a very different thing, you're discovering new knowledge as opposed to just learning about what's already known. I suppose the graphic does capture that in a way but it's subtle.

Awesome!

I get it, So a Ph.D. is like a pimple or an erection?